Gemayel; Fighting Between the Lebanese, Syrian-backed Mosems is a ‘sideshow’ Designed to Prevent Wit

President Amin Gemayel of Lebanon, in a television interview broadcast today, said the fighting between the Lebanese and Syrian-backed Moslem militias is a “sideshow” aimed at preventing the withdrawal of Syrian troops from Lebanon.

Gemayel, whose interview was taped yesterday for the ABC-TV “This Week With David Brinkley” program said it is “clear” that the “Syrians are behind” the fighting now going on. He said the result is that “on-body is talking” about the withdrawal of foreign forces from Lebanon but instead are concentrating on the current fighting.

The Lebanese President said that if he were able to sit down face to face with Druze leader Walid Jumblatt, “we would be able to reach an agreement in five minutes.”

Jumblatt, in an interview today on the CBS-TV “Face the Nation” program, while attacking Gemayel, also indicated he would be willing to discuss with the Lebanese President a political solution that would give more power to the various Moslem religious groups in Lebanon, But he indicated that there would have to be a cease-fire first and that the Lebanese army would have to withdraw from the Shouf mountains.

Abdallah Bouhabib, Lebanon’s Ambassador to the U.S. appearing on the same CBS program, declared that the Lebanese army has more Druze in its ranks than Jumblatt’s militia. He also claimed that more people from the various religious groups in Lebanon are in the army than in the various militias. Bouhabib denied that the government was controlled by the Christian

Phalangists, saying there were no members of that political party in the government. But former Vice President Walter Mondale, appearing on the Brinkley program, said the U.S. should be doing more to press Gemayel to bring non-Christian groups into the government which, Mondale said, he has not been doing.

Mondale, a candidate for the Democratic Presidential nomination in 1984, said the U.S. has to define its role in Lebanon and should do so in partnership with Congress. He said the marines were sent into Lebanon last year in the belief that Syria would withdraw but the Syrians, supported by the Soviet Union, do not want to leave Lebanon.

Mondale, who said the War Powers Act should be invoked, said the marines should be defended but that they should no take over the fighting for the Lebanese army. Gemayel had stressed earlier that Lebanon does not want the marines “to die for us” but they were in Lebanon to help with the process of national reconciliation.

MARINE CORPS CHIEF’S VIEWS OF THE FIGHTING

Gen, Paul Kelly, Commandant of the Marine Corps, who also appeared on “Face the Nation,” gave a different interpretation of the fighting now going on in Lebanon. He said the departure of the Israelis from the Shouf mountains left a “vacuum” which the various groups are now trying to fill and that they were “positioning ” themselves to get into a better military posture to negotiate a cease-fire.

He said that Lebanon is now “on the verge of maintaining a stable government” and to suggest that the marines leave would be “close to criminal.” Kelly stressed that the marines’ position is defensive and he believes that they are being shelled because they to strategic positions at the Beirut airport and the main east-west highway and not because they are a U.S. force.

He said the shelling by U.S. warships yesterday were against those in the Shouf mountains who had shelled the marine positions. He said if any Syrian troops were in as Damascus has charged, then that was because Syrian forces were in an area where they were not supposed to be. He refused to comment on what the U.S. would do if the Syrians attacked the U.S. forces as Damascus has threatened.

In outlining what he believed U.S. policy in Lebanon should be, Mondale also stressed that the U.S. should demonstrate to Israel “out commitment to her security, a joint, a security relationship that makes it clear that our support for Israel is unquestioned.”